US suburbs are growing, but also growing poorer

Slate - How the Suburbs Got Poor

There are multiple factors that have contributed to the relative decline of suburban life; though Slate may misinterpret the facts about the decline: while suburban poverty grew twice as much as urban poverty did from 2000-2011, there is still a higher rate within US cities, notably because three times as many Americans live in the suburbs than the cities. But still, in the last decade, the growth in suburban life (most especially in the US South, in conjunction with job growth) has been accompanied by an historically disproportionate growth in the suburban poor. Partly this is because low-paying jobs accompany higher-paying ones, as middle- and upper-class people occupy the suburbs. Another reason is because of urban gentrification that pushes the poor to the suburbs. Long-standing historical forces include successive waves of white flight even from suburbia, and the great diminishing of the single-earner, two-parent household for the single-household/single-parent phenomenon. With living preferences changing, so is the appeal of the house maintenance and civil engagement common in the post-war era. The implication is there is a negative feedback loop, from white flight & urban gentrification to diminishing property values to fewer local revenues to, finally the Ferguson-esque methods of preying on the poor in search of local revenue: exorbitant traffic fines and penalties that prop up town budgets. The article talks about the two kinds of successful suburban landscapes: walkable towns with mixed use buildings and living arrangements, and, paradoxically, staunchly middle- and upper-class suburbs that fiercely protect their property values (and pay concomitant property taxes) to protect the "character of their neighborhoods".